


Tales of The Apollo Cabin

by Mischiefkingwinkyface



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan, The Trials of Apollo - Rick Riordan
Genre: Apollo Cabin - Freeform, Cute, Doctor Will, Doctor Will Solace, Fluff, Humor, M/M, One Shot Collection, Pre-The Trials of Apollo, infirmary, solangelo, the apollo cabin has two braincells, will solace has one of them
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:54:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28016535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mischiefkingwinkyface/pseuds/Mischiefkingwinkyface
Summary: A series of one shots of the day-to-day life of living in the Apollo Cabin at Camp Half Blood.Contents1 - Welcome to the family2 - Late night conversations3 - The swear jar4 - Never anger Will Solace5 - Bedside manners6 - The buddy system7 - Why Apollo shouldn't be allowed to sire twins8 - Dares and drinks9 - Family traditions
Relationships: Nico di Angelo & Will Solace
Comments: 13
Kudos: 74





	1. Welcome to the family

Notes: As soon as the Apollo kids hear that Will has a boyfriend, they insist he must be officially introduced to his new self-proclaimed stepsiblings. Neither Will or Nico thought it sounded a particularly good idea, but have you ever tried refusing a cabin full of over excited musicians with weapons?  
\---

The first thing Nico noticed was the noise. What the noise was exactly, he couldn’t be sure, but the sheer volume was enough. If he had to guess, he’d have to say it was coming from the dozen different kids practicing half a dozen different instruments. That alone made his stomach turn. 

The second thing he noticed was that all eyes were on him the second he walked through the door, Will practically pinned to his side. It was just for a little while. That’s what Will had promised on their way there. He didn’t have to stay if he didn’t want to. 

Will’s hand brushed against Nico’s before latching on to interwind their fingers. “My bunk is right over here.” He led Nico away from the eyes to sit on his bed.  
Any other time, Nico might have pulled away. He might have snatched his hand back or at least flinched at the touch, but not this time. He was much too stunned to refuse his boyfriend’s guidance. The warm wrapped hand around his own cold fingers kept him grounded enough to actually pay attention to what was happening around him. 

Will perched next to Nico to whisper in his ear, close enough his warm breath hit cold skin. “You’ve got this.”

Nico nodded, finally gaining the courage to break contact despite Will’s pout. 

“A lot of people have lost a lot of bets today,” a girl wandered over to them. 

“Kayla,” Will smiled up at her. “Dare I ask what you were betting on?”

“If you two would stop pining and actually get together, amongst other things,” she had shrugged. She waved at Nico and laughed when he awkwardly waved back. 

Will had asked Nico to be nice. Actually, he had ordered Nico to be nice. So, Nico was going to be nice. He had a gut feeling this would be harder than he’s first thought. 

Somewhere amongst the crowd of Apollo campers staring at them, someone whispered, “Ready? 3… 2…”

The whole cabin burst into music and song. This time it was all one sound loud enough to make ears bleed. One group were clutching brass instruments, another had guitars, another had various other string instruments. The rest were singing, most of them managing to stay in tune within the large crowd. 

Will closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his noise, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like, “Of course they did…” It seemed they hadn’t exactly consulted him on the decision before planning the whole spectacular event. 

That, in and of itself, was an issue for later. Most likely after Nico had gone. It was rare that Will was willing to lose his cool in front of Nico, and it was unlikely this would be one of the few exceptions. 

Frozen on the bed like a deer in headlights, Nico wouldn’t even dare blink. This must be what it’s like to have a wasp nest land directly on your head. That is, if the wasps were wearing orange t-shirts and singing showtunes with an unnatural amount of harmonies. 

As soon as the, whatever on earth that performance just was, had finished in an untimely manner, what seemed like the entire Apollo cabin was grinning at him expectantly. One of the guys yelled over. “Good, right?”

Nico heard Will muttering beside him something about how Apollo must have made a mistake. He must be a son of Athena, or really anyone more subtle than his train wreck of a cabin. 

Nico started laughing. He couldn’t help it. Less than ten minutes ago he had been stood outside the cabin listening to some speech by his boyfriend about how they could leave at any time then he got serenaded by an entire cabin while Will looked like he about to break the Hippocratic Oath. 

Most of the Apollo kids cheered when Nico smiled, the rest still eyeing Will nervously. A few high-fived. 

Will finally relaxed. He leaned into Nico absentmindedly and chuckled. “Only in this cabin.” Them touching must have set off another cog in the singular braincell that was controlling the Apollo cabin because it made it all start up again. 

“Kiss!” One of the girls yelled.

“Shut it!” Will called back, blushing crimson up to his ears. 

That must have been the wrong things to say, as the rest of the cabin was now chanting, “Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!”

Will covered his face with his hands and shook his head. 

That meant that the decision was left to Nico. He had been told to be nice to them all… and they had prepared that song for him. “Will?” He asked. 

Will looked out from behind his hands and lowed them to his sides at the look in Nico’s eyes. “Yes?”

Nico’s fingers gripped the collar of Will’s Camp Half-Blood t-shirt and pulled him into a kiss. 

The cabin cheered again. Everyone finally seemed satisfied from watching them and started to disperse by the time Nico released him. Not that it mattered who was still there by that point, it was only Will in Nico’s eyes. 

Will stared at him, eyes wide as saucers, as he caught his breath. The world could’ve ended that day, that moment if it so wished. It didn’t matter anymore. “Are you ready to go yet?” He asked. 

Nico shook his head. “Just a little longer. I’m starting to like it here.”

It was another hour before they left. An hour of people asking questions and making comments about all the wagers that apparently had followed their relationship so far. It was an hour of people, but Nico couldn’t bring himself to mind too much. 

“Nico, hold on!” The first girl, Kayla, had yelled at them when Will reached for the door. 

Nico turned back, exhaustion starting to set in. 

She grinned at him, “Welcome to the family, Nico.”

With that, Will led him out of the cabin. The door swung shut behind them, leaving the noise where it belonged. Far far away from them. 

“What do you think of my siblings?” Will asked as they walked away. 

Nico shrugged. “I think I might like them.” Despite everything, he couldn’t help smiling for the rest of the day.


	2. Late Night Conversations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Days may be full of singing and bandages and sunshine, but the nights were a different story. Sometimes it took a while for the campers to switch their brains off long enough to sleep.

There are many things people tended to not notice about the Apollo Cabin. A lot of the kids there had a reputation for being the literal sunshine children of the camp. People forgot a lot of their duties happened to be the most important ones in camp. Working long days in the infirmary to save campers’ lives. Leading the singing at the campfire to keep morality at its highest. These were all very important, and often emotionally taxing, roles. 

Winding down after a long day could take a while sometimes. 

Will had just gotten comfortable in his bunk. The quilt was warm. His mind was almost quiet. And he was starting to doze off into a comfortable sleep he desperately needed. That is, until he heard a voice cut through the darkness. 

“Have you ever wondered,” one of the older boys said, “whether we are technically doctors?”

“We only treat minors,” Another camper cut in. This one was the girl in the bunk next to Will. “That makes us pediatricians.”

Will turned over and pulled his pillow over his head, but that didn’t block out the third voice joining the conversation. 

A younger camper called over to the two already debating. “We don’t have degrees, idiot. That makes us medics.”

Will groaned loud enough to silence the rest. He sat up enough to lean on his elbows. “In a second none of you are going to have hands to be any of those things. Do I make myself clear?”

A murmur of agreement rippled through the cabin before all the offending parties fell silent. Finally, some quiet. 

With a sigh, Will settled back under the quilt. Comfortable warmth? Check. Peace in the cabin? Check. Mind quieting down? Check. Just as long as everyone stayed like this a little longer it would be perfect. 

“Pst,” someone stage whispered. 

“What?” Another voice did an equally bad job of keeping their voice low. 

“We should start deciding winter campfire songs soon.”

“It’s October!”

“You won’t live to see winter if you don’t stop talking!” Will sat up fully this time, throwing the pillow towards the sound and hearing a muffled “ow” as it hit its mark. The cool air hit his bare arms, making him shiver against the autumn air. Was no one asleep? 

You could have heard a pin drop in the cabin then. The campers who were still awake to witness it pulled blankets and pillows over their heads. The ones speaking mumbled apologies before settling down. That was that. No more talking. No more discussions. 

One more time. Comfortable warmth? Ish. Peace in the cabin? For now. Mind quieting? Not a chance. At least no one was talkin-

“Dare you to stand over Will’s bed and see if he notices.”

Will didn’t even know who that was, but he was done. He climbed to his feet and tucked his remaining pillow under his arm. “Do you want to be target practice tomorrow?” He snapped. “This is how you become the target.”

A few voices shouted at him to go back to bed. It was late, well past midnight by then. 

He threw a blanket over his shoulder to stop himself shiver and glared around the room. “I have worked twelve hours today in the infirmary. Do not make me go Texan on y’all this late at night.”

“Where are you even going?” The first boy to speak yelled after him. 

That made Will freeze. Where was he going? It was the middle of the night, and he was carrying around a pillow. If someone caught him, it wouldn’t be the easiest thing in the world to explain. 

“Nico’s cabin,” he answered. It seemed the only logical thing to say. Nico would let him in. He only stopped to pick up his other pillow from where it hit the floor before heading out into the chilly night air. 

Will was stood outside Nico’s door only minute later. He forced himself to knock before he lost his nerve and breathed a sigh of relief when the door actually opened.  
Nico was stood there in his pyjamas, running his hand through the mop of hair in an attempt to make it appear an organised kind of messy. His eyes widened when he saw Will at his door. “What happened?”

Will put on his best puppy eyes and hugged his pillows to his chest miserably. “Can I stay with you tonight?”

Nico nodded, stunned, and held the door open for Will to come in. He watched his boyfriend curl up on his bed with pillows still hugged to his chest before moving to sit next to him. “Is everyone okay?”

“No,” Will mumbled into the pillows. 

“Is anyone… Did anyone die?” Nico hovered his hand over Will’s shoulder, preparing himself in case the other boy began to cry. 

Much to Nico’s surprise, Will laughed. “Someone was about to be if they woke me up one more time. Although,” Will considered his words, “the night’s still young. They might find a way.”

Nico frowned.

Will looked up at him. “I wish I was an only child. If I hear the words ‘I dare you’ one more time someone’s lips are going to get sewn shut.” 

Finally relaxing, Nico nudged his boyfriend. “Budge. You’re taking up all the space.”

Will tossed the pillows aside and moved so that he could become Nico’s pillow. He closed his eyes as he spoke. “I’m not sure there’s a single braincell amongst my siblings sometimes.”

“Careful,” Nico mumbled, “you’re beginning to sound like me.”

“I would curse them to rhyme for weeks… But they’d probably like that,” Will mused. 

“Go to sleep, Will.”

“I could make them do a solo at the campfire… But they might like that too.”

“Just go to sleep.”

“What about bandage duty at the infirmary? That can get boring sometimes.”

Nico groaned loudly. “You may be my significant annoyance, but that doesn’t mean I won’t kick you out for keeping me up.”

Will laughed, hiding his face in Nico’s hair. “Sorry, Sunshine.” 

A comfortable silence fell between them. After fighting for sleep all that night, Will found him drifting off into the sweetest dreams he’d had all week.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I will be using fanfiction to cope over the winter holidays, so feel free to suggest chapter ideas!


	3. The Swear Jar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The infirmary is home to many things that may or not require explanation. Out of all the things people struggle to ignore about the children of Apollo, the swear jar that lives in the infirmary is a camp favourite.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a warning that there will be a fair amount of swearing in this chapter! I know it's probably expected, but it makes me feel better to let y'all know in advance.

The swear jar had been Will’s idea. There was no getting around it. 

The jar hadn’t been empty for more than an hour since its unfortunate start in life, and Will didn’t have a single doubt in his mind that it was going to stay like that for a very long time. Without getting into too much detail about the origins of the glass jar filled with drachmas and sweets and whatever else someone happened to be keeping in their pockets while working, that jar was there as a deterrent. A very poor deterrent at that. 

It was common knowledge that the doctors in the infirmary swore. A lot. Fighting alongside happy healthy heroes could be a frustrating enough task without having to deal with injured heroes. Injured heroes were, without competition, the second worse patients in the world. 

The worst patients in the world were the Apollo Cabin residents themselves, not that they would admit it. 

To cut a long story short, Will was having a bad day. “Capture the flag,” he muttered to himself for the fifteenth thousandth time that afternoon. “What a wonderful idea. Let’s allow all the preteen warriors to stab each other with real weapons in what we refuse to call a death match. Fantastic.” 

“That’s mine!” Some Ares kid yelled after him when he tried to dispose of half a spear head he’d only just removed from someone else’s arm. 

Will froze mid stride and turned on his heel to face the child of Ares. “You forfeit your right to the spear head when you broke it in another person’s arm. Do I make myself clear?”

There must have been something in Will’s tone, as the Ares kid just nodded. 

Will nodded back and walked away to dispose of the shrapnel.

A voice several steps behind him snapped, “Stop being such a little bitch and sit still!”

“Swear jar!” At least two other voices yelled before Will had the chance. 

Will paused, shaking his head to himself with a laugh. The money in that jar was usually put aside for any heroes sent out on quests. Sometimes, if they all banded together to enforce the rules, the contents of the jar were split between people in the cabin. 

That’s how he knew his siblings had their eyes on something, they always started enforcing the jar, so he didn’t have to. He wasn’t completely sure he wanted to know what they were planning.

The camper that had sworn stalked past Will to the jar. He stared Will straight in the eyes. “B-I-T-C-H.”

“That’s another one,” Will informed him with a sweet smile before heading back out amongst what was left of the injured. 

He had been in the middle of lecturing one of the Hephaestus campers while pulling pieces of a misfired whatever out of them when he heard one of his siblings take off on a rant at a child of Ares, not even slowing when everyone turned to watch. 

“No!” She threw a roll of bandages at them. “Look here you fucking self-destructive dick. It is my job to get your piece of shit-for-brain, dumbass, self out of here in one piece. My damn job. Now, if you want me to do. That. Damn. Job. You will quit your whining and Sit Still. Am I making myself clear? Because, and I cannot stress this enough, you asshat, next time you need a limb reattaching I will put it on backwards. You hear me? Backwards.”

Shooting a glare at Will on her way past, she emptied all her pockets into the swear jar, and walked straight out of the infirmary doors while mumbling under her breath. 

All eyes were on Will then, waiting for any sort of response. He stood there for a solid thirty seconds before tiredness overtook him and he burst out laughing, doubling over as he did. Everyone was still staring by the time he pulled himself together to speak. “Well, you heard her. Listen to your doctor, kids.”

He turned back to his own patient. He couldn’t quite remember what he had been lecturing them about before, but it didn’t seem to matter anymore. The entire infirmary had just learned why you don’t anger his cabin while they’re trying to heal you.


	4. Never Anger Will Solace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Apollo cabin is known for being hard to control, but they sometimes push it a little too far. In other words, there are three stage's to Will's anger, and they have seen them all.

Head councillors were usually at least a little intimidating. It’s nearly impossible to survive long enough to become leader of a bunch of unruly demigods without learning how to command respect when needed. The difference with the Apollo Cabin, is that no one expected Will to be so good at discipline until he was disciplining them. Within weeks of him leading the cabin, any occupant of those walls would be able to describe exactly what happens when someone makes him mad.

There are three stages to Will’s anger:

—

Stage one is the gentle smile.

Will smiled all the time, but those smiles were bright as the sun. They would light up entire rooms until everyone else was smiling too.

The first time anyone saw Will’s angry smile was only a few weeks after he became head councillor.

Until then, they were all reeling too hard from the battle of Manhattan to be able to get up to anything they weren’t supposed to.

A fight may or may not have broken out between the Apollo and Ares cabins yet again. There was still some tension between the cabins after the whole flying chariot incident, and a few disagreements had been broken up before they could escalate in the days before. This time, no one broke up the fight, and three Apollo campers ended up pacing their cabin while someone fetched Will to ‘deal with them’.

The three of them exchanged looks. It wasn’t like they’d never been in trouble before, there wasn’t a single camper in their cabin that hadn’t caused trouble at one point of another, but no one had dared see what happened when Will got involved.

Everyone had known that Lee Fletcher would rant and pace for a while before marching whoever it was to apologise to just about everyone he could find. It was embarrassing, sure, but it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. People who had really messed had to go on the ‘Lee Fletcher apology tour’, but that was more of a rite of passage than anything else.

Michael Yew hadn’t exactly scared them, but he was a lot to deal with when he was angry. There was always a lot of yelling when dealing with him, and gods help whoever tried to shout back.

Will Solace, on the other hand, had been making trouble with them only a few weeks before. He wasn’t really any older than them, and he had always been the one to _start_ the stupid dares, not stop them. It didn’t seem fair that they were waiting for his discipline, not when he was the one that found out exactly how far you could push Yew before becoming target practice.

So, none of them knew what to expect when Will walked in, looking tired with his infirmary clothes still on, and shut the door behind him. He didn’t look at them at first, just wandered over to his bed and sat down. Then he ran his hand through his hair and smiled at them. “Who wants to explain?”

The three looked to one another. None of them really wanted to be the one to talk to him, not while he was staring at them like that.

That wasn’t the Will they knew. The Will Solace they knew would catch them by the arm with the biggest grin and whisper, ‘you gotta promise not to tell Lee if this goes wrong,” and, ‘no telling whose idea this was, alright? If we go down, we go down together.’

Except Will was smiling over at them with the kind of smile that barely tugged at his lips and didn’t reach his eyes. He laughed to himself, a breathy, humourless sound. “I don’t suppose you’ll tell me who started it either?”

Loyalty has always been important to the Apollo Cabin. No councillor has ever managed to get a name out of a group before, they always had plans to cover up whose idea it was. That is, until Will asked them, and two of the campers moved to point at their friend without daring to speak.

Will nodded, still smiling. He made eye contact with the camper who had just been thrown under the bus by his accomplishes. “You two can go,” he said, voice deceptively even. “Kayla needs help in the infirmary.”

The pair exchanged looks before falling over each other to get out the door, leaving the last child of Apollo alone with their angry councillor.

Will patted the space next to him. “How about we have a talk?”

The camper left, James, found himself sitting next to his brother, not daring to look him in the eyes. “I’m sorry, Will.”

“I know you are,” Will’s smile never wavered. “You’ve put me in a difficult position, you know? Clarisse is angry, and I don’t know how to do this. I could do the patented Lee Fletcher apology tour or shout like Yew used to.”

“I am sorry, Will.”

“I do expect you to apologise,” Will continued, barely acknowledging that his brother had spoken at all. “And I will be coming with you to do it. I just…” Will reached over to rest his hand on James’ cheek, forcing the younger boy to face him. “I know you, James. You’re better than this.”

James nodded again. He would have preferred facing Chiron to having his brother gently tell him how he could do better.

Will patted James’ cheek before getting to his feet and brushing himself off. “I might have to keep the apology tour for the new campers, but I’ll only make you apologise to the Ares Cabin. Deal?”

“Deal,” James muttered. Even though this was the lightest punishment given in Apollo Cabin history, he couldn’t help but wish Will had just fired an arrow at him or something.

—

Stage two was the Texas accent.

Despite them all technically knowing that Will was from Texas, Will had been around Camp Half-Blood so long that his accent had levelled somewhat over the years.

No one realised he could still channel that accent until it was late into an infirmary shift after a capture the flag game, and nothing had gotten done in the past hour.

The entire place was a mess, there was still the occasional demigod getting healed, and half the Apollo campers that were meant to be working had taken to hiding from their duties.

Capture the flag had once been one of Will’s favourite games, but since he became head councillor it had become nothing more than an annoyance. It was so much worse when his siblings weren’t helping him clean up.

It was getting scarily close to midnight when Will started feeling his nerves fraying. He slammed his hand on the desk he’d commandeered since becoming head medic, causing everyone around him to go dead silent. “Y’all need to work or get out. I ain’t dealing with the crap, ya hear me?” 

No one dared move. No one dared breathe.

Kayla took a step forward. She rested her hand on Will’s arm. “Are you okay?”

He smiled at her. That soft smile that put the Apollo campers on edge. “Whoever doesn’t want to work needs to get out of my way. Now.”

Most of the campers in there were already backing out the door. Except Kayla. She pried a pen from Will’s hands and stepped away from him. “Go back to the cabin.”

His expression didn’t change. “Give me back my pen.”

“You need sleep,” she told him. “I’ll get it cleaned up here.”

Fatigue was starting to kick in, so he nodded. “I’ll see you in a bit?”

She nodded. It took Kayla practically pushing him out the door to force him to go back to the cabin to get some rest.

The second he stepped through the door, barely enough time for his shoes to hit the cabin floor, the entire cabin fell silent. The campers were all stood around talking, no shock there, and turned to stare at Will.

Will didn’t have it in him to pretend to care. He walked straight through them all to flop on his bed with his arm over his eyes.

The other campers took to whispering around him.

After attempting to block out the noise of his siblings, Will let out a heavy sigh. “Y’all, I need sleep if you don’t mind.”

The cabin was the quietest it had ever been that night. When Will woke the next morning, the infirmary had been scrubbed clean. The good behaviour had lasted only a few hours, but it was worth it for the little bit of peace Will managed to get in that time.

Ever since then, all it would take was for Will to sigh and utter “y’all” for the rest of his cabin to be on their best behaviour for a little while. The other councillors were soon a little jealous of that ability.

\--

Stage three was the glare.

They all feared the glare. The only time Will would stare straight past the person he was talking to, fixing the wall behind them with a steady glare that wouldn’t shift for anything. If he ever walked into the cabin glaring, then it was every man for himself.

The first time someone experienced the glare was soon after Will and Nico started dating. Summer was coming to a close, and tensions had been high for some time. Most of the Apollo Campers had been having a hard time since they were all struggling to get any response from their father. Because of this, Will had been going easy on them.

Then Will heard yelling one day while walking with Nico. The pair of them drifted towards the sound until Will stopped, horror overtaking him.

One of his experienced campers was in a fistfight with an Athena kid, one no older than eleven to make matters worse.

Will rushed in with Nico by his side. Nico caught hold of the son of Athena while Will wrestled his sister away. He held her by the shoulders to scan over the bloodied nose and split knuckles. “What the Hades were you thinking?” He hissed, keeping his voice low.

She just stared at him, eyes as wide as saucers. She opened her both to speak but snapped it closed again without a word.

“Will?” Nico asked. He had the son of Athena by the arm.

Will glanced over his shoulder at them. “Drop him off with Kayla in the infirmary and go get Annabeth.”

Knowing that Nico would be able to sort everything, Will grasped his sister by the wrist and dragged her to the Apollo Cabin. There were other campers there when they arrive, but they all scatter like mice when they saw Will march in.

“Mary,” Will started, spinning on his heel to face the girl. “You better have a good explanation for this?”

She nodded. “I promise, Will. I’m sorry. I-”

“Sit down,” he ordered, pointing to his bed. Once she’s sank into the seat, he pulled her arms out by the wrist to look at the knuckles.

Mary had tried explaining, she really had. She told him about the arguments she’d gotten into and how the fight was a long time coming. She’d told him that her opponent had thrown the first punch, and she’d only fought back to avoid being shown up by a literal child.

But no matter what she said, he never looked at her. The only reaction he ever made was wincing in sympathy occasionally while he tended to her wounds. All the rest of the time he just glared down at her hand.

“Will?” She asked, her heart pounding.

Will had never been so quiet before. Even when angry, he’d always led the conversation. It had always a judgement-less lecture about how he was going to help them be better than to pick petty fights. He’d always comforted them, explained to them why he was angry and how it could all get better.

He raised his eyes to meet hers briefly before looking back at her hands. With a soft sigh, he tightened the bandage over her knuckles. “You will heal from this the mortal way,” he told her.

Mary nodded numbly.

“And you will spend the rest of the day sat on those steps.” Before she knew it, her hands were released, and Will was scribbling on a large piece of card.

The piece of card was pushed into her hand. Will glared over her shoulder at the wall. “Do not put that down. Am I clear?”

“Yes, Will.”

“Go,” he ordered. There was no ‘please’ or gentle hand on her shoulder to guide her out the door. He never even looked at her when she left.

Not even the smirks of the campers staring at the sign on her knee that read “I LOST A FIGHT WITH A CHILD” stung as much as the coldness she’d seen from him.

—

No one realised there could be a fourth stage to Will’s anger until they met their father.

Apollo visited camp from time to time even after regaining his status as a god. Usually, he’d just hang around Will and Nico for a couple of hours before leaving again, but once he’d decided to take a walk around camp all afternoon.

That happened to be the same day Mary and James got themselves into trouble. It wasn’t serious, not like it could have been. They’d just chipped a piece off the steps of the Hades Cabin by accident and _knew_ Nico would kill them when he found out.

“What do we do?” Mary asked, still clutching the piece of obsidian.

James stared at her hands, eyes wide. “I don’t know. Do we tell Will?”

“I don’t want to be the one to tell him,” she groaned before pausing and glancing up at her partner in crime. “You know how you said you’d rather deal with Dad than Will?”

He nodded slowly, not liking at all where the conversation was heading.

“I’ll tell Will if you tell Dad,” she offered with a shrug. “That way we’ll know for sure which one’s worse.”

James couldn’t help but smile to himself. He never backed down from a challenge. “Sure,” he grinned. “Good luck dealing the accent.”

“Oh please,” she huffed. “This is _so_ not accent worthy.”

“This is _so_ accent worthy. Make sure to look sorry so he doesn’t start glaring.”

With that, they took off in opposite direction.

Apollo didn’t seem to care much when James started spilling what had happened to him. In fact, Apollo, in the form of Lester, had just stood there unnaturally quiet and stared at his son. Only once James had finished his story did Apollo speak. “Why are you telling me this?” 

“Because I didn’t want to tell Will,” James admitted. “He scares me.”

Apollo, naturally, took his son by the arm and walked him to the Apollo Cabin, talking idly about how dealing with everyday accidents wasn’t exactly part of his godly duties.

Upon entry to the cabin, they were met by the sound of Will’s voice. “If I told ya once, Mary,” Will was saying, his Texan twang hitting hard on the r.

James grimaced. Apparently, this was accent worthy.

Will spun to face them, looking drawn out with his arms crossed over his chest. He looked like he’d just come from the infirmary, a soiled shirt laid on his bed while a clear one hung from his hand. “I’m busy as all get-out, Dad,” he snapped. “This better be good.”

“Will, we’re sorry,” Mary said.

As if everything snapped into place at once, Will’s eyes met James’. His expression went cold, cold enough that Apollo himself shifted uncomfortably. “You didn’t come to me.” His eyes were locked on James, shining a brighter blue than usual from the tears threatening to fall.

This time he didn’t look away. There was no glare aimed at an inanimate object, just a look like shattered ice in Will’s eyes.

“I’m sorry,” James whispered.

“I’m going to stay at Nico’s tonight.” Will marched past them, straight out the door.

The entire cabin had been on edge that evening. Will had sat at the Hades Cabin table with Nico through dinner, and everyone was shooting glares at James. To make matters worse, Will was still crying.

He spent all of dinner with his head resting against Nico’s shoulder, eyes rimmed red. He whispered something to his boyfriend, a single tear rolling down his cheek, only seconds before Nico got to his feet.

The son of Hades stalked his way over to the Apollo table and glared at the entire cabin worth of campers. “I want a name,” he demanded.

The campers shared uneasy glances, none of them daring to look straight at James lest Nico pick up on who had caused Will’s crying. They’d betray their siblings for Will’s wrath, sure, but Nico was a whole other story.

“I just want to talk,” Nico told them despite having a hand resting on his sword.

“It was me,” James admitted, looking anywhere except where Nico’s glare had turned to him.

“Get up,” Nico ordered, pulling out the sword as he spoke.

The pavilion fell silent. All eyes were on Nico, most likely wondering if they were about to witness an execution. Chiron opened his mouth to get involved but was quickly shushed by half the campers there and Mr D, who looked to be getting invested.

James pushed himself to his feet, ready to face whatever fate Nico had planned for him. The tip of Nico’s sword was pressed against his sternum and the older demigod growled:

“Follow me.”

Everyone watched as James was marched over to the Hades table with a sword pressed to his back, stopping to stand in front of a still crying Will. Will wiped away his tears hastily .

“Nico,” he whispered. “I told you not to.”

The sword nudged James back, thankfully not hard enough to cause injury. “Apologise right now,” Nico ordered. “I expect grovelling.”

James sank to his knees in front of Will, not even caring about the Ares campers snickering at him. “I’m sorry, Will. I have never been this sorry about anything in my life.”

Will looked to Nico then back at James. He shook his head, voice cracking when he spoke. “I’m staying with Nico tonight. Kayla’s in charge.”

With that, he got to his feet and walked away, leaving James on the floor. Nico ran after his boyfriend, leaving everyone to stare at James still knelt there.

When Will returned to the Apollo cabin the next morning, he refused to listen to any apologies. When he spoke, it was as if nothing had happened, but no one wanted to see a repeat for as long as they were at camp. That was one lesson they would never forget.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y'all. There will be a oneshot coming separate to this series about what happened when Will was a new kid at camp and had to do the Lee Fletcher apology tour. 
> 
> As always, comments are appreciated.


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